Russian Hacker Pyotr Levashov Arrested

Russian Hacker Pyotr Levashov was just arrested in Spain at the request of the DOJ and FBI. Russian television station RT reported that Levashov was arrested under a US international arrest warrant and was suspected of being involved in hacking attacks linked to alleged interference in last year’s US election.

Peter Carr, a spokesman for the US Justice Department’s criminal division, said the case was under seal so the agency was unable to comment.

According to sources, he was responsible for making malware that may have been used to promote Trump in the United States Election.

However, he is known in the underground marketing world as one of the top email spammers in the world, associated with Alan Ralsky. According to Brian Krebs, “Peter Severa” is widely considered the author of the Waledac botnet.

He’s been a well known hacker since the 1990s, and many people think that his actions go way beyond that of just spamming. He has said in hacker message boards that he is associated with the FSB, and that he’s helped in some official capacity the Russian government in anti-terrorist initiatives.

Several member of the hacker community confirmed that he was linked to hacking in other elections in Lithuania and Estonia, perhaps at the behest of the FSB.